Wednesday, 27 August 2008

Window Washer Falls to His Death in Manhattan

Multiple reports on new death of Robert Domaszowec:
Police say the body of the 49-year-old Robert Domaszowec was found Tuesday afternoon outside the building in Greenwich Village. Police determined he had fallen from the 12th story. Earlier Tuesday, two Manhattan window washers whose basket scaffold got stuck on the outside of a skyscraper were rescued by police.
Yesterday afternoon, a window washer fell 12 stories to his death from a Greenwich Village building. The incident occurred at 40 Fifth Avenue, a 17-story apartment building near 11th Street. A witness said, "Around 4:30 p.m., I hear the people screaming, screaming and screaming call the police." The NY Times reports that the victim was a "well-liked," "self-employed contractor who had been washing windows and doing other work at the building for 20 years." While the incident is being investigated, the man was wearing a harness. Earlier in the day, two window washers were rescued after their scaffolding basket stalled around the 30th floor of a Times Square skyscraper.

A worker washing windows at an apartment building in Greenwich Village fell 12 stories to his death on Tuesday, the police said. The victim, was a self-employed contractor who had been washing windows and doing other work at the building for 20 years, a police official said. The man was well-liked among residents of the building, the official said. The police said it was unclear what caused the man to fall from the 17-story building at 40 Fifth Avenue, near 11th Street. Witnesses, including several workers from nearby buildings, said the victim was wearing a harness when he fell. The man fell to the sidewalk in front of the red brick building, a sponge and squeegee by his side and what looked like a harness strapped around his waist. The Buildings Department said it was investigating the man’s fall and had not issued any violations in connection with the death. It was the most recent in a string of fatal falls of window washers.

Video here.


A window washer plunged 12 stories to his death on Tuesday in Greenwich Village, police said.
Witnesses said Robert Domaszowec, 49, was wearing a harness. An FDNY source said safety hooks supporting the self-employed window washer from upstate Kerhonkson gave way. "We heard something like a table dropping," said construction worker Felix Arriaga, 23, who was fixing a roof across the street from the 12-story building. "Then we heard someone yell, 'Ahhhh!' We didn't think anything of it until we came outside." Police - along with officials from the city Buildings Department's scaffold safety team and the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration - searched for clues outside the building at 40 Fifth Ave. Residents described Domaszowec as a familiar fixture in the neighborhood, known for his cleaning skills, and someone who came from a family of window washers.

Hours earlier, police rescued two window washers whose basket became stuck on the 30th floor of a midtown building. Police pulled the two workers to safety through an adjacent window. Neither man was injured. Two window washers were trapped outside the 30th floor of a Times Square building for almost two hours yesterday morning, when the scaffolding basket they were in stalled. The police said that at 8:34 a.m. yesterday, they received a 911 call from two men at 3 Times Square, at Seventh Avenue between West 42nd and 43rd streets, who said that they were unable to move the scaffolding basket they were in up or down. The police sealed off the street on Seventh Avenue between 42nd and 43rd streets. Speaking at the scene, Officer Martin Brown, of the Police Department's Public Information office, said that the two men were rescued when the police removed an adjacent window, and brought the men into safety. Neither man was hurt.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Buildings, Kate Lindquist, said that department inspectors arrived at the scene and issued a violation to the window cleaning company, Collins Building Services, "for failing to provide adequate safety lines." A spokeswoman for that company told the New York Sun, "right now, we aren't answering any questions."
A building close by at 1 Times Square was where a pane of glass fell more than 40 floors onto scaffolding on August 16. No one was hurt in the incident.

Video here.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Damn city worrying about taxing people instead of checking all these older buildings windows.The support bolts that the belts hook onto pop right out of those turn of the century rotten wood windows.The metal frame ones are nice and strong but not the old wood ones. People pay millions for these apartments and just as much to refinish them but overlook simple common sense saafety guidelines.

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